Officials in the city of Ottawa in Canada are thinking of tapping the massive amounts of snow that fall during the winter to help save energy come summer. According to CBC, a study on how to utilize "cold energy" from snow is currently underway. What they plan to do is shovel the snow off of the roads and then use wood chips for insulation to prevent everything melting at least until the snow is slated for use (around September). The cold melted snow will be fed to tubes running through buildings during the summer, thereby lowering costs related to air conditioning.

Since it cost Ottawa $88 million (US$71 million) to remove 14 feet of snow that fell last winter, the people behind the project are confident that citizens would accept the move positively. "I think our taxpayers would be a lot happier knowing that that snow, instead of just piling up and melting and costing them money, was actually being reused," says Diane Deans, Ottawa city councilor. The New Chitose Airport in Japan is planning on a similar cooling system to debut on 2010.